AHL: Worcester Sharks' Daniil Tarasov line unsurpassed, at least for one night

The Sharks' most famous line is the Crazed Rats — Andrew Desjardins, John McCarthy and Dan DaSilva — but what has been their best line?

The offensive clinic put on by Matt Nieto, Daniil Tarasov and Freddie Hamilton in Worcester's 8-2 victory over Portland last Friday night raises that particular question. They combined for five goals and six assists, while all were plus-4.

For one night, it's Nieto-Tarasov-Hamilton. No Sharks line has had a better one-game performance when you add up the production. Also, no Sharks line has had that many pure prospects on it at the same time.

Comparable lines from the past include the Logan Couture-Ryan Vesce line from 2009-10, and the Joe Pavelski-Mathieu Darche line from 2006-07. Both lines had various third parties.

Couture and Vesce had Steve Zalewski, Brandon Mashinter and Benn Ferriero. When Ferriero was on his game, it was a dynamic line, and at that point in his career, Mashinter looked like he'd be an NHL power wing.

Darche had 19 goals in the first 20 games of the Sharks' first season — that's how good Pavelski was until he got called up. That line originally had Michal Macho on a wing, then Grant Stevenson. When Graham Mink was healthy, he played the right side, and that was a devastating line on the power play.

The IceCats had several memorable lines, too. The best was in 1996-97 when Craig Conroy was briefly in Worcester. His linemates were Scott Pellerin and Jamal Mayers. Among them, they wound up playing 2.460 games in the NHL.

Maybe Nieto and Hamilton will be back and be reunited with Tarasov. Maybe McCarthy will be back and two-thirds of the Crazed Rats will be together again. For now, though, for a one-night stand, there has been nothing quite like last Friday at the DCU.

Behaving themselves

One reason the Sharks have turned it around is that they've been staying out of the penalty box, and especially staying out of the penalty box in pairs. Worcester had to kill 75 penalties in its first 13 games and has killed 15 in its last seven games. That translates into 13 power-play goals allowed in the first 13 games to two in the last seven.

The biggest part of that is two-man-down goals. The Sharks have had 10 times when they've been three-on-five and have given up five goals in those situations. Again, those 10 times all happened in the first 13 games. Worcester has not been two men down since.

Catching up with ...

Former IceCats captain Ricard Persson is a European scout for the Wild; Sharks short-timer Antero Niittymaki works for the Flyers as a scout; T.J. Trevelyan, a 28-goal scorer for the Sharks in 2009-10, is in his third season with Augsburg of the German Elite League.

Former Shark Nathan Longpre is in his second season with the Chicago Wolves; original Shark Dan Spang and short-time Shark Patrick Davis are playing for Lappeenranta in Finland; and original IceCats broadcaster John Wiedeman is still calling games in Chicago for the Blackhawks.

Jackets stick with Springfield

Springfield and Columbus have extended their working agreement through 2014-15. It seems as though the Falcons have finally found their right partner. The Blue Jackets are their ninth NHL affiliate since 1994-95, when they joined the league, and Springfield is on a pace to make the playoffs for the second straight year after missing them for a record nine consecutive years. … The Pirates' return to Portland seems more likely now that Ron Cain has taken over as principal owner of the team, buying out Lyman Bullard and Brian Petrovek, although they both retain minority shares. Cain told the Portland Press-Herald that his main goal is to move the franchise back to Portland from Lewiston even though he owns the Colisee. Last week in Lewiston, the game between the Pirates and Manchester took as long as a World Series game — 3:17 — because it took 45 minutes to fix a big hole in the ice. … There is a long, long way to go in the season, but it certainly seems like Grand Rapids is a candidate to do what used to happen a lot, but doesn't happen much any more — win back-to-back Calder Cups. It has happened just twice since 1979. Jimmy Roberts' Springfield Indians did it in 1990 and '91, then the Hershey Bears did it 2009 and 2010. … Thanks mostly to Ryan Strome, the Bridgeport Sound Tigers have taken the lead in the Battle of Connecticut over Hartford. Strome is Player of the Week for the second straight week, something that only Jim Carey (1994) and Blake Geoffrion (2011) had done before. The Sound Tigers have scored 63 goals, and Strome has either scored or set up 33 of them. The Islanders snapped a 10-game losing streak with a shootout victory in San Jose on Tuesday night — the Sharks blew a two-goal lead in the third period, just like Worcester was doing early in the season — and one had to ask how long the Isles could go before seeing what Strome can do in the NHL? Not long, he was called up on Wednesday. … Meanwhile, Hartford has lost seven of its last eight in regulation, scoring merely 11 goals during the skid.

On this date ...

The IceCats played the only game that a Worcester AHL team has played in Milwaukee on Dec. 12, 2002, and beat the Admirals, 4-3. Milwaukee had run out of goalies due to injuries at the AHL and NHL level, and had Brant Nicklin in net for the only AHL appearance of his career.

The IceCats got goals from Igor Valeev, Jason Dawe and John Pohl in the first period and another from Mark Rycroft in the third. Phil Osaer got the win in net as Nicklin allowed four goals on 19 shots.

Defense keys spurt

It has been a long time since the Sharks have played as well as in their last 10 games. Worcester is 7-1-2 for 16 points in those 10 games. It has been almost exactly two years since a Sharks team did that. The 2010-11 Sharks also were 7-1-2 in 10 games from Nov. 25 through Dec. 17.

This is a start, but Worcester has a long way to go to match the all-time hottest Sharks team, the 2009-10 Atlantic Division champions. That team picked up 49 points in a 29-game span from Nov. 21, 2009 through Feb. 5, 2010. That's an .845 winning percentage — pretty hard to top.

Like this one, that team also got hot after being cold. Those Sharks were 2-8-0 in the 10 games before the hot streak. This year's Sharks were 3-7-0.

Even while he was enjoying the aftermath of the Portland offensive outburst, coach Roy Sommer made a point of saying that everything with his team begins with the defensive side of things. That has been the case throughout the surge. In the last 10 games, Worcester has allowed only 19 goals. That gives the Sharks a chance to pick up points each time they play.

They take on Manchester at the DCU Center on Friday night, then take on Portland again in Maine on Saturday. The 2010-11 Sharks turned out to be just a team that got hot, but could not maintain it and missed the playoffs. The year before tha,t they were just really good.

Almost any AHL team can be hot for 10 games or so. Starting this weekend, Worcester has a chance to show that it is more than just one of those teams.